Weezie,
Are you mashugana, saving all of those little pieces of our clothing? I could understand the National Record Mart sweater logo, I wouldn’t have given that away either, but the others? A golf hankie, a piece of your mother’s silk blouse, the crème suit we bought for her to wear to her 75th birthday party and even a remnant of your blanket from when you shared your room with Nana? Thank God, you have finally cleaned out that box so that this will be the last we see of them.
Yet, I have to hand it to you; it is amazing how you continue to find ways to make beautiful meaningful quilts. And now as if sewing wasn’t good enough, you are writing for the Chronicle no less? Who could have predicted that? You have accomplished so much more that we ever expected. For sure, you should have been a Rebbetzin.
Fate brought us together by the stage door of the Broadhurst Theater after his performance in “Once Upon A Mattress”. He left that first night saying he had to catch the train. It was the Long Island Railroad that took him to a little apartment above the 24 hours Dunkin Donuts in Port Washington.
He called it his Love Nest but it needed a little work. Before I got there, he barely existed amongst unopened boxes, a queen size mattress, a small desk with a computer, and a small portable tv. When I looked in the frig and saw only a quart of skim milk and radishes he laughed and explained that skimmed milk on ice was his drink of choice and that he threw the radishes out the window to quiet the guys who hung outside the Dunkin’ Donuts late into the night. What else did he need?
After the first visit, every time I drove in from Pittsburgh, I added things: blinds for the windows, IKEA table and chairs in the kitchen, a twin bed sofa for the living room, coffee tables, pillows, lamps, and lots and lots of quilts.
Accompanied by fellow Canadians living in Manhasset, he took great joy in exploring NY. We visited Central Park, SoHo, and all kinds of ethnic neighborhoods. One of our field trips was to Jackson Heights above 74th Street known as Little India where he encouraged me to buy two Indian style outfits, composed of a long tunic called a khameez, loose front tie pants called salwar and topped with a long scarf called an odhni.
These Indian outfits both found their way into my Memory Quilt in addition to a wonderful blue and white pinstripe man’s nightshirt that he gifted to me and a thin wale creme colored corduroy shirt that he worn because he knew I loved the soft feel of the fabric.
I lived in Point Breeze from 1978 to 2001 and while I was there, my favorite place for clothing was Pittsburgh’s Best-Kept Secret, Panache. Even to this day, probably 25% or even more of my closet is from my Panache shopping days and I haven’t been there much since I moved to the SouthSide.
Suzanne is special- a small retailer who zeros in on the artsy-easy clothing that will satisfy her East End customer. It’s lots of fun to stop in to visit with her and see the latest additions to her inventory. Sometimes its the accessories, another time there are shoes, another time a special coat. In the winter, there is always my favorite corduroy in every shape and form, in the summer soft cozy cotton.
I have another quilt that I made about ten years ago that is almost all Panache clothing- solid color linens, cottons. velvets, and satins with some simple batik prints and stripes thrown in. Every time I look at that quilt, I think of my shopping days at Panache and now much joy I got wearing that clothing.
This memory quilt that I am documenting for The Container Project has five different articles of clothing from Panache. There is a funky purple print cotton pants suit, a three piece striped linen outfit, a red t-shirt with satin trim, a rayon print vest, and a blue cotton chambray suit.
Thinking about it, makes me want to make a trip over there tomorrow!
How sweet of you to send me your stash of batiks. There is enough here to make a great quilt. I will save them until something calls me.
I recently made a quilt of important personal materials and one of the fabrics I included was the remnants of the batik I used to make your jacket. Look at the quilt photo and see how many of the pieces you can find scattered throughout the piece:
Way back in 2006 when I made the jacket, I loved the material so much that I hoarded the remnants. How could I throw away those little pieces of beauty? Gathering my personal materials of memory, I found them and knew that I had saved them for this purpose.
Know that you will always hold a special place in my heart through this quilt.
It started like this- about six weeks ago, I realized I was missing something. It was a red string from a dear friend that always hugged a photo in my bathroom. In a past blog, I explained the importance of the red string to ward off the evil eye. I looked everywhere for my red string, could not find it, and reluctantly replaced it with a turtle necklace from the idea that “it’s turtle all the way down”. Not that the red string and a turtle mean the same thing, they don’t, but for me, it was having something on my photo to make me stop and be aware.
Then I went to show someone one of my favorite embroideries of me with my kids that usually sits on my book case and it wasn’t there. I looked everywhere over and around the bookcase on every single shelf hoping to find it. When I didn’t, I wondered if it was possible I had taken it as a sample of my work to a talk and left it there? I searched every one of my bags and through all of my supply shelves. I asked my daughter if by chance I had given it to her and then I reluctantly gave up any hope of finding it and decided my lesson was to simply be able to let it go.
Last week I got dressed for a special event and reached for my favorite necklace and could not find it. I was heart broken. My parents bought it for me from an antique jeweler on our last trip to Israel together back in 1991. I kept it along with another necklace from Israel with a hamsa which was also missing. Once more, I searched every jewelry box, drawer, suitcase, unable to locate either necklace.
Giving up all of these things as gone, I have been trying with all of my might, to simply let go. Wondering where on earth each could have gone, grieving the loss, and then letting go. “They are only things” I kept telling myself.
And then the magic of grace occurred during my weekly meditation. It went like this. My mind went to the necklace, I missed it. I gave it up as lost. My mind went to the embroidery, I missed it. I gave it up as lost. My mind went to other embroideries I made including one I had done of my mother, my grandmother and me on the top of a jewelry box and with that I realized this was the only jewelry box I didn’t check for the necklaces and why? Because it was still on the top shelf of my container.
When I dismantled My ContainerI made a conscious decision to remove the clothing, books, dishes, and food but keep the sacred things on the top shelf as a remnant of the Container Project- once again to mark a place and keep me more aware.
I came home, went to the armoire and there they were, the red string, the embroidery, and both necklaces along with a self portrait, a photo card from Steve, the quilt from the cover of my book, and my personal memory quilt of of my mother’s jean suit- all right there in my container to not only keep me more aware, but to help me feel gratitude for the security of a container for all of my sacred things.
Have you ever googled your name to see what shows up? I try to do it regularly, to make sure anyone interested in having a memory quilt made will find me easily. I search under SilkQuilt, BubbeWisdom and Louise Silk.
This week I discovered something very unusual. A local artist took my photo and made the “Louise Silk Shoe”.
I guess I should be honored that the self-appointed People’s Shoemaker included me with the likes of the “Andy Goldsworthy Shoe”, the “Manet Monet Sneekers” and his most recent “Justice For Trayvon”.
Funny- yes, entertaining- maybe, but I am totally flummoxed as to how I might translate this interesting publicity into more quilt business.
As I have reported many times before, I have lots and lots of t-shirt remnants and my daughter, Sarah and I are developing products to sell when she graduates from school this spring.
My latest idea is to sell large squares of knit fabric to replace tissue- kind of like a hankie but way more. I got the idea from taking care of my granddaughter Hailey. The last time I was with her, she had a runny nose. I decided to keep one of her little wash cloths in my pocket for her nose. It worked great- soft, reusable and durable.
This weekend, I made 100 of these for Sarah to sell. Here they are:
How does one access the Divinity within? The Hebrew word for glue is דבק dvk, the root for devekut, which in modern Hebrew is a synonym for dedication toward a particular goal.
The mystic meaning of devekut is cleaving or attaching oneself to The Holy One. It occurs frequently in Deuteronomy (4:4, 10:20, 11:22, 13:5, 30:20) in the context of cleaving, being near to or in communion with The Holy Spirit.
During prayer or meditation, devekut, cleaving, takes the practitioner up the spiritual ladder of the ten Sefirot, the divine aspects, to varied levels of mystical contemplation.
In 1994, I presented a Spiritual Tent for Women at the Pittsburgh Jewish Community Center to create an environment for devekut.
Nachmanides defined devekut as the state of mind in which one constantly remembers The Holy One’s Love.
Is there a practical way to become a master of intent, consistently focused on achieving this mystical cleaving?
Currently installed in the Jaffe Book Art Collection at Florida Atlantic University is a spiritual tent I made over the summer of 1993.
It is a two-sided tent 8ft X 8ft X 7ft high machine pieced and quilted out of 100% cotton purchased broadcloth. The outside is made of 12 soul panels created from applied strips of cotton. The inside is a patchwork scene of mountains, rivers, sky and clouds. The original sign on the door said, “Women, only, enter one by one.” Some ten years later, I altered the words to what is written now, “Please enter one by one”.
At the time I made it, I was trying to make a statement about the exclusion of women from the religious aspects of male dominated Jewish practice. In orthodox settings women are separated from men by a mechitza. In response, I made this tent for women that would exclude men.
Eighteen years later, standing in my creation, I was struck by the amount of time and effort I put into this project. I remember well the anger and exclusion I felt propelling me to make such a massive statement.
It’s a powerful piece and I’m proud to be the artist, but truth be told, if I were to create a new statement, I wouldn’t bother to go to such extreme lengths to exclude men. If they don’t see the value in including us- it’s their loss.
BubbeWisdom 